To build bridges between Palestinian artists and cultural creators from around the world, to claim that solidarity is a strength, it is time to create the Onboard Cultural Center !
In the flotilla's waves - Global Sumud Flottilla - Spring mission 2026
The Onboard cultural center
In the flotilla's waves
The onboard cultural center
Joining the flotilla toward
Gaza
During previous solidarity crossings, aboard flotillas that attempted to break the blockade of Gaza, notebooks, accounts, and images produced on board were often thrown into the sea or seized during military interventions, erasing the human trace of our commitment.
As artists, journalists, activists, and cultural professionals, we refuse for solidarity to once again be confiscated or silenced.
Gathering testimonies, creating to anchor them
In response to this urgent need to preserve memory, we want to make the sea a space of creation, resistance, and living circulation of works.
While media coverage ensures immediate and necessary visibility for action, artistic creation unfolds over the long term, anchoring memory and offering narratives that survive the urgency of the moment – thus building a cultural heritage for our struggles.
Sharing this memory through art, disseminate it freely
Beyond the urgency to sail toward Gaza, the boat will be a space of free dissemination, a moving tool for residencies and touring across the Mediterannean sea.
The original creations sheltered by the boat are meant to meet an audience through various cultural partnership, such as exhibitions, residencies, performances, …
Art of testifying
SIGNATORY LIST
Abdelmajid Labidi, photographe (TUN), Arab et Tarzan Nasser, cinéaste (PAL), Angela Flahault, autrice, compositrice, interprète, plasticienne, collectif ADN (FRA), Ariane Ascaride, comédienne (FRA), Baptiste André, médecin du Madleen (FRA), Baptiste Sellier, enseignant, Université Paris 8 (FRA), Bernard Friot,sociologue du travail, Réseau Salaria (FRA), Bettina Zourli, autrice féministe (FRA), Boris Boublil, musicien, compositeur, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Bartosz Ostrowski, veteran des flottilles choregraphe, danceur, acteur (PL/PT), Bien Dobui, maîtresse de conférences, Université de Picardie (US), Cécile Hercule, chanteuse (FRA), Cali, artiste (FRA), Caroline Fay, comédienne, Cie C’est la Goutte d’Eau (FRA), Candice Raymond, Historienne (FRA), Carsie Blanton, autrice/compositrice (USA), Catherine Lecoq, artiste (FRA)Cécile Grollimund, autrice compositrice, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Cédric Herrou, co-fondateur Emmaus-Roya (FRA), Claude Léostic, vétérane des flottiles, militante AFPS (FRA), Claudine Pellé, autrice, comédienne, metteuse en scène (FRA), Denis Lavant, comédien (FRA), Edmond Baudoin, dessinateur (FRA), Elham Mouaffak Hatfield, humanitaire, militante GSFr, GSF-SA, Humanitaire (ZAF), Elias Sanbar, écrivain (PAL), Emilie Jobin, comédienne, Cie C’est la Goutte d’Eau (FRA), Emilien Urbach, vétéran des flottilles, artiste Cie C’est la goutte d’eau, journaliste à l’Humanité (FRA), Emily Loizeau, artiste, compositrice, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Emmanuelle Destremau, auteure, compositrice, interprète, réalisatrice, collectif ADN (FRA), Enzo Barnaba, écrivain (ITA), Eric La Delfa, comédien, Cie C’est la Goutte d’Eau (FRA), Ernest Pignon Ernest, artiste (FRA), Eyal Siva, cinéaste (FRA), Farah Sayem, Curatrice, chercheuse (TUN), Farouk DARGAÏ, Chirurgien humanitaire et président Solidarité Santé Mayotte Réunion Debout (FR), Federico Annibale, écrivain, Réalisateur (ITA), Florence Heskia, coordinatrice nationale GSFr, militante UJFP (FRA), Françoise Vergès, autrice, directrice de recherche à Londres (FRA), Guillaume Meurice, humoriste (FRA), Hippolyte, reporter-bd (FRA), Jean-Louis Ruf, musicien, compositeur, syndicaliste (FRA), Jî Drû, musicien, compositeur, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Madhi Blackwind, rappeur (MAR), Malika Bouaya, vétérane des flottilles, infirmière (FRA), Mandine Guillaume, artiste, Cie C’est la goutte d’eau (FRA), Marie-Louise Lettaneur, Programmatrice culturelle (Reims) (FRA), Marine Larat, artiste-acrobate (FRA), Marion Rampal, artiste, auteure, compositrice, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Marion Slitine, chercheuse, fondatrice de Maan for Gaza artists (FRA), Maud Santini, anthropologue, professeure à l’ENSA Versailles (FRA), Melissa Laveaux, auteure, compositrice, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Michela Gribinski, professeure agrégée (retraitée), Sorbonne Université (FRA), Miquéu Montanaro, compositeur, créateur de passerelles, musicien (FRA), Mohamed Abusal artiste visuel (PAL), Mohamed Ghazali Khous, ambassadeur GSFr-Marseille, conseiller Funéraire (FRA), Muzna Shihabi, Présidente association Bayati (PAL), Nacira Guénif, professeure des universités, Université Paris 8 (FRA), Nadine Naous, cinéaste (LIB), Ours, musicien (FRA), Pierre Dharréville, journaliste, écrivain, ancien député français (FRA), Pierre Schoeller, cinéaste (FRA), Philippe Oddou, marin, éducateur, créateur Route du Za’atar (FRA), Rachele Borghi, maîtresse de conférences, Sorbonne Université (ITA), Rawan Odeh, programmatrice culturelle (PAL), Renaud Séchan, chanteur (FRA), Sadia Agsous-Bienstein, enseignante-chercheuse, Sorbonne-Nouvelle (FRA), Sandra Iché, metteuse en scène (FRA), Saif Fradj, Artiste multidisciplinaire, Réalisateur (TUN), Sandra Nkaké, artiviste, auteure, compositrice interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Sébastien Gronnier, secrétaire du Casi Cheminots Paca (FRA), Sébastien Thiéry, artiste, collectif Pérou (FRA), Sonia Fayman, militante UJFP et ATL Jénine (FRA), Sophie Fustec, auteure, compositrice, interprète, collectif ADN (FRA), Stéphanie Latte Abdallah, historienne et anthropologue CNRS (FRA), Syphax Allek, directeur de production festival NJP (FRA), Taysir Batniji, artiste visuel (PAL), Thomas Guénolé, vétéran des flottilles, politologue (FRA), Thomas Vescovi, doctorant, co-fondateur de YAANI (FRA) , Valerie Bournet, artiste (FRA), Nacira Guénif, professeure des universités, Université Paris 8 (FRA), Valérie Jouve, photographe (FRA), Véronique Bontemps, chercheuse au CNRS (FRA), Yosra Ghliss maître de conférences, Université de Picardie (TUN) …
Organisations : les Amis du Théâtre de la liberté de Jénine, la Compagnie C’est la Goutte d’Eau, le Collectif des artistes sans frontières, la Global Sumud France, le Collectif Maan for Gaza Artists, l’Union Juive Française pour la Paix, Pluriversité, Artistes pour la Palestine, L’Éducation avec Gaza, Universitaire Avec Gaza, Organisations : les Amis du Théâtre de la liberté de Jénine, la Compagnie C’est la Goutte d’Eau, le Collectif des artistes sans frontières, la Global Sumud France, le Collectif Maan for Gaza Artists, l’Union Juive Française pour la Paix, Pluriversité, Artistes pour la Palestine, L’Éducation avec Gaza, Universitaire Avec Gaza, SFA-CGT PACA, Fédération Nationale de la Libre Pensée, la CGT spectacle …
OUR CALL
Call for an Onboard Cultural Center
To break the blockade of imaginations and to ensure that a ship dedicated to cultural resistance joins the flotillas for Gaza, let us create the Onboard Cultural Center (ECC).
In Palestine, cultural life is hindered by military attacks striking Gaza, the West Bank, Jerusalem, and Palestinian cities within Israel. Artists, researchers, journalists, and cultural actors are regularly targeted, sometimes even killed. Elsewhere in the world, initiatives aimed at welcoming or protecting those who keep Palestinian culture alive face persistent political obstacles. The dissemination of works connected to Palestinian realities, as well as media coverage of international solidarity, is deliberately silenced, frequently obstructed or criminalized.
During previous solidarity crossings, aboard flotillas that attempted to break the blockade of Gaza, notebooks, accounts, and images produced on board were often thrown into the sea or seized during military interventions, erasing the human trace of our commitment. As artists, journalists, activists, and cultural professionals, we refuse for solidarity to once again be confiscated or silenced. In response to this urgent need to preserve memory, we want to make the sea a space of creation, resistance, and living circulation of works. While media coverage ensures immediate and necessary visibility for action, artistic creation unfolds over the long term, anchoring memory and offering narratives that survive the urgency of the moment—thus building a cultural heritage for our struggles.
Today, we launch a call for solidarity to bring forth a vessel that will become the Embarked Cultural Center in the wake of the flotillas for Gaza: a place of creation, preservation, and transmission linking the flotillas to Palestinian territories. Let us imagine a sailboat conceived as a moving studio, a floating museum, a refuge for memories, and a space for artistic co-creation between onboard creators and artists in Palestine.
The OCC is designed to begin taking shape today, while remaining adaptable to the forms future flotillas might take. It is also conceived as a tool that fosters cultural, political, and imaginative circulation, both at sea and on land. On board, works will bear witness to lived violence, amplify silenced voices, and weave sensitive bridges between seas and lands: colours, sounds, words, and traces of shared lives. Exchanges may take many forms—artistic correspondences, cross-sent sketches or fragments of narratives—nurturing continuous back-and-forth movements between sea and land.
By becoming a mobile conservatory, this vessel will protect archives and original creations from any zone of military arbitrariness, establishing creation as an essential bulwark against erasure. The flotilla movement is a necessary political act, but around it a new shared momentum can arise—an ode to artistic vitality that will extend far beyond the timeframe of immediate action.
Beyond its primary mission, this project also seeks to liberate our Mediterranean Sea, so that it ceases to be a barrier sea or a cemetery for exiles. The OCC will also help facilitate the mobility of artists from the Global South and contribute to a horizontal artistic exchange to collectively imagine the future of this shared space.
We need your support to finance the implementation of this project: the acquisition of the boat, its equipment, the securing of archives, and the establishment of transcontinental artist residencies. By supporting this project, you help break down illegitimate borders that suffocate imaginations and allow solidarity to shine far beyond the waves.
Get Involved
You are a cultural institution willing to help us ? You have access to production budget ? Ability to host artists, a performance, an exhibition?
You are a company offering navigation, photographic,… equipement ?
Contact us to build a partnership !
Artists, individuals receiving media coverage, support us by signing our call and sharing the donation campaign on your social networks
To support this initiative : join our fundraising
